Top 10 Videogame developers Sega should work together with

It has become quite an impressive trend: Videogame publishers and developers cooperating with each other. Team Ninja did Metroid for Nintendo, Western developers produce games for Capcom and American developers outsource their leveldesign to Chinese production company. But which possibilities lie ahead for Sega in that perspective? Hit the jump to find out…

10. Epic Games

Let’s face it, Sega is having some major problems when it comes to the Western markets. Their Japanese franchises work absolutely great in Japan, as the successes of Yakuza and Phantasy Star show, but those franchises struggle way more in our regions. What is the obvious solution to do? Well, produce a third person shooter. The problem is, they already tried that with vanquished and failed. Now they are retrying it with Binary Domain and the echo from the press isn’t too great, even though gamers voted it one of the most popular games of this year’s Tokyo Game Show. The easiest way out of that situation would be to work with Epic games on a third person shooter franchise. Since those guys practically invented it with Gears of War, it would be a no-brainer.

9. SNK

SNK hasn’t been doing all that great these past few years, but they still know how to do Fighting games. In the past, they had a Capcom versus SNK series going on, with a certain success. It would be really awesome to see what they could do in a Sega versus SNK series. Sure, Sega ‘only’ has Virtua Fighter, but it would be no problem to make 2D versions off of those characters…

8. Access Games

Most of you probably don’t know Access games, but in some circles they are known for two things: Swery65 and Deadly Premonition. Swery65, much Suda 51, is an unique videogame creator that has created one of the weirdest, most interesting Horror games ever, namely ‘Deadly Premonition’. It would be awesome to see, what would come out if Sega and these people would work on a game together…

7. Harmonix

Space Channel 5 is one of those series where I really don’t understand why there aren’t more games coming out. Rhythm games may have been more popular a few years back, but it still is a popular niche. When it comes to rhythm games, Harmonix is one of the masters. I’m certain they could create great games based on that franchise.

6. Cave

Cave Shmups simply are the best ever created. Fantasy Zone is a long dormant Sega Shmup that is quite unique for its genre. I personally think they could do great things together and turn it into an awesome downloadable title!

5. Atlus

Unlike Square Enix, Atlus knows what they are doing when it comes to JRPGs. Sega got several franchises that would perfectly fit into that category: Phantasy Star, Shining Force and Skies of Arcadia. I think Atlus would be more than able to develop awesome titles for these franchises or even create a completely new one.

4. Grasshopper

Goichi Suda (or Suda 51) is one of the most brilliant and interesting videogame creators of all time. He has a tendency, just like Swery65, to do very weird games and really, there are some Sega games that would be a great fit. Seamen would be something Suda would love, but really he can turn anything into gold.

3. Retro Studios

Everything that Retro Studios have touched for Nintendo has been a hit so far. They brought Metroid into the third dimension, revived Donkey Kong Country and they are working on the next Mario Kart for the 3DS. They could revive any old franchise by Sega and make it a pretty decent game.

2. Capcom

Sega versus Capcom. Same thing as with the SNK cooperation, but I would like this one way more. Throw in characters Street Fighter, Dark Stalkers, Power Stone and Dark Stalkers and you have a winner.

1. The Behemoth

I’m personally a huge fan of Streets of Rage and Golden Axe, but unfortunately, these franchises have been dormant or forgotten by Sega for a very, very long time. The Behemoth are the makers of Castle Crashers, which pretty much single-handedly revived the brawler genre. If they were to take on those old Sega franchises, it would be a match made in heaven! Streets of Rage HD? Yes, please!